I feel I must congratulate John Coxon on his take of the problems of the closure of so many waste disposal facilities, writes Helen Cripps.
Especially as the lack of such causes more problems to continuous cruisers such as myself.
I have been attempting to get off the Leeds & Liverpool Canal for most of the year to get further south where there is more chance of cruising, but with the lack of water and the stoppages it has been near impossible.
And so I have had great trouble getting rid of my rubbish as the facility I used when I first tackled the canal was no longer there when I managed to get back, and then a closure had me stuck.
There is this thing about separating different waste, but I have not had any any notice of it, and when I did discover a facility open there were just rubbish bins and no separate ones for different items. In any case, us continuous cruisers use every inch of our restricted space on our boats and no way can we have the room for separate bins for separating rubbish especially if unable to empty owing to the facilities no longer in use. Just where would you pile it in 45ft boat?
As John points out: 'The situation is becoming more and more of a problem for continuous cruisers. Having to travel further and further between service sites when travel can be very restricted due to various factors many of which are of CaRT's own making? We can't even take it to a council tip as most will not let you in if you do not have a local post-code and many will not allow pedestrians in at all'.
I certainly agree with him, when he states that as has he 'predicted many times CaRT are making life as hard as they can for continuous cruisers'.
It is getting very hard indeed, and must be worse for those who have an Elson that needs emptying so often. At least I have a tank, but even that became a worry when I could not reach a pump-out facility.
The way things are going with lack of rain closing down waterways and repairs taking 'forever' there will be far fewer boats on the canals. Or is that what is wanted....?